Past Camp Half-Blood Reads House of Hades
by Brilliant Stranger
Summary: Title says all. The Cabin Councillors, Grover, and Chiron of the time between the Last Olympian and the Lost Hero read the magically-appeared House of Hades book.
1. Chapter 1: Look What I Found!

**DISCLAIMER: I, OBVIOUSLY, DO NOT OWN ANY OF THESE CHARACTERS. THEY ALL BELONG TO RIORDAN, THE GOD OF TROLLS AND UNNECESSARY DEATH.**

* * *

 _"OW!_ "

A yell came from Half-blood Hill, and the demigods currently near it stopped what they were doing and stared. Connor Stoll came running down, rubbing his head with an annoyed expression overtaking his face. In his hand he clutched a thick book, which made a lot of campers gape. It was _that_ odd a scene.

"This thing just came out of nowhere and fell on my head!" Connor yelled, waving the book. "Okay, who did that?" Everyone within hearing range just looked at him. No one could take him seriously with his messed up brown curls and freckled face and grumpy look on his usual mischievous face.

"Can I see that, Connor?" Katie Gardner, a demigod who was just walking by, asked. She took the book out of his hands without waiting for a reply and looked at the front cover. Her jaw fell open, and her dark brown eyes widened. She looked like she had seen a ghost.

"What's wrong, Katie?" a camper asked, concerned, but she just shook her head.

"I think Chiron needs to see this."


	2. Chapter 2: What the Heck is That?

**DISCLAIMER: I, OBVIOUSLY, DO NOT OWN ANY OF THESE CHARACTERS. THEY ALL BELONG TO RIORDAN, THE GOD OF TROLLS AND UNNECESSARY DEATH.**

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Chiron, in his wheelchair form, looked around the table in the Big House. Present were Percy Jackson, who was fiddling with the Riptide pen; Annabeth Chase beside him, twisting a strand of thick blonde hair and staring into space, probably thinking of some new architecture ideas for that rebuilding Olympus job she had; Grover Underwood, chewing thoughtfully on tinfoil; Connor and Travis Stoll, Clarisse La Rue (she complains about having to do boring stuff like this, but throws a fit when she's not invited); and the other Cabin Counselors: Katie Gardner (Demeter cabin), Will Solace (Apollo cabin), Jake Mason (Hephaestus cabin), Drew Tanaka (Aphrodite cabin), Pollux (Dionysus cabin), Butch Walker (Iris' cabin), Clovis (Hypnos cabin), and Lou Ellen (Hecate cabin). Dionysus was somewhere else or the other, thankfully.

"Ahem," Chiron cleared his throat, and immediately the chattering ceased and everyone turned to look at him at the head of the table. "The reason I have assembled you all here today-"

"Why talking so stiff?" Travis said loudly, emitting snickers from his twin brother.

"-is because earlier this morning, a rather odd-"

"-And painful!" (Guess who).

"-incident brought us this book. Please don't interrupt me again, Stolls." Chiron brought out the same book from the morning and placed it on the table. It was a big book and everybody around the table could see the cover, which was richly illustrated. It portrayed dark, foggy skies, streams of lava, and a golden, cracked door held down by chains and two shadowy figures, one supporting the other with their backs to the reader, heading towards the doors.

"Doesn't look that special," Clarisse muttered. "It's just a stupid book."

Annabeth craned her head, blowing the hair out of her face, and read the title: "House of Hades?"

Nico, who was slumped into his chair and pointedly oblivious to everything going on around him, straightened and stared at the book. "What does that mean?" he demanded. The other demigods around the table murmured to themselves. All eyes looked at Chiron for an explanation. Their thoughts echoed Nico's: What _was_ going on?

The centaur picked up the book and flipped the cover, looking at the short summary on the back of it. His eyes scanned the writing, and his expression turned grave. "I think it is important for us all to read this book." he announced. "For it apparently is about the future."

The reaction to his statement was at first a silence, then disbelief. There were voices coming from all over the room: "How would a book hold the future?" "That's insane!" "When are we having lunch, I'm starving!" etc.

"Silence!" Chiron finally declared. Everyone quieted down. "The future is a dangerous thing and it is dangerous to tamper with it. But I believe this book came to us for a reason, and what better than to read it?"

"Couldn't hurt," Percy shrugged, leaning back in his chair. "But I'm not reading it, not with my dyslexia."

"Seaweed brain," Annabeth muttered, and Percy shrugged.

"I will read it to you all," Chiron said, looking unsure as he flipped the book to the first page. "At least, I hope that's what fate wants us to do, and we won't mess everything up by doing this."


	3. Chapter 3: Hazel

**DISCLAIMER: I, OBVIOUSLY, DO NOT OWN ANY OF THESE CHARACTERS. THEY ALL BELONG TO RIORDAN, THE GOD OF TROLLS AND UNNECESSARY DEATH.**

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A/N: The things bolded below are, obviously, from the real House of Hades book.)

 **"During the third attack, Hazel almost ate a boulder."**

"Hey, Travis?"

"Yeah, Connor?"

"Do rocks taste good?

" _Why are you asking me?!_ "

 **"She was peering into the fog, wondering how it could be so difficult to fly across one stupid mountain range, when the ship's alarm bells sounded. 'Hard to port!' Nico yelled from the foremast of the flying ship."**

All heads turned towards the young, pale boy who stared right back at them. "What? Why is everyone looking at me? It's the future, okay? I don't know anything about it more than any of you!"

"I'm just trying to imagine you as a sailor," Percy protested. "Hm...maybe we can go fishing together so you'll know how to and you won't drown or anything in the future!"

To Nico's obvious relief, Chiron kept reading.

 **"Back at the helm, Leo yanked the wheel. The** ** _Argo II_** **-"**

"They recreated the _Argo_? That's so cool! And it flies! I wonder what the design is for that-"

"Shut up, Annie, we're trying to listen!"

"Wait, who's Leo?" Grover spoke, confused.

Percy asked him, "Well, then, who's Hazel?"

"I dunno."

"Then that's my answer for your question."

 **"-veered left, its aerial oars slashing through the clouds like rows of knives. Hazel made the mistake of looking over the rail. A dark spherical shape hurtled toward her. She thought:** ** _Why is the moon coming at us?_** **Then she yelped and hit the deck. The huge rock passed so close overhead it blew her hair out of her face.** ** _CRACK!_** **The foremast collapsed—sail, spars, and Nico all crashing to the deck."**

Present-time Nico winced, and this little movement was noticed by the campers around him, and they all turned and stared at him. " _What?_ "

 **"The boulder, roughly the size of a pickup truck, tumbled off into the fog like it had important business elsewhere. 'Nico!' Hazel scrambled over to him as Leo brought the ship level.**

 **"'I'm fine,' Nico muttered, kicking folds of canvas off his legs. She helped him up, and they stumbled to the bow. Hazel peeked over more carefully this time."**

"Learns from her mistakes, good girl!"

 **"The clouds parted just long enough to reveal the top of the mountain below them: a spearhead of black rock jutting from mossy green slopes. Standing at the summit was a mountain god—one of the** ** _numina montanum_** **, Jason had called them."**

"Who's Jason?"

" _Will everybody just shut up and listen?_ "

"Sheesh. Short-tempered, much?

 **"Or** ** _ourae_** **, in Greek. Whatever you called them, they were nasty."**

"I've met one before," Clarisse offered from the back of the room. "Nearly broke my electric spear."

"Wait, what? I thought I broke your spear-"

"I got a new one. Although I wouldn't _have_ to if you punk hadn't broken it in the first place-"

" **Like the others they had faced, this one wore a simple white tunic over skin as rough and dark as basalt. He was about twenty feet tall and extremely muscular, with a flowing white beard, scraggly hair, and a wild look in his eyes, like a crazy hermit. He bellowed something Hazel didn't understand, but it obviously wasn't welcoming. With his bare hands, he pried another chunk of rock from his mountain and began shaping it into a ball. The scene disappeared in the fog, but when the mountain god bellowed again, other numina answered in the distance, their voices echoing through the valleys.**

 **"'Stupid rock gods!' Leo yelled from the helm.** ' **That's the third time I've had to replace that mast! You think they grow on trees?'**

 **"Nico frowned. 'Masts are from trees.'"**

"You got him there, Nico!" Travis cheered.

"Stop talking to the book, Stoll!"

"I'm not talking to the book, I'm talking to you!"

 **"'That's not the point!' Leo snatched up one of his controls, rigged from a Nintendo Wii stick, and spun it in a circle. A few feet away, a trapdoor opened in the deck.**

"Cool!"

 **"A Celestial bronze cannon rose. Hazel just had time to cover her ears before it discharged into the sky, spraying a dozen metal spheres that trailed green fire. The spheres grew spikes in midair, like helicopter blades, and hurtled away into the fog**. **A moment later, a series of explosions crackled across the mountains, followed by the outraged roars of mountain gods. 'Ha!' Leo-"**

-and actually the Stolls and Percy-

 **"-yelled. Unfortunately, Hazel guessed, judging from their last two encounters, Leo's newest weapon had only annoyed the numina. Another boulder whistled through the air off to their starboard side.**

 **"Nico yelled, 'Get us out of here!' Leo muttered some unflattering comments about numina, but he turned the wheel. The engines hummed. Magical rigging lashed itself tight, and the ship tacked to port. The** ** _Argo II_** **picked up speed, retreating northwest, as they'd been doing for the past two days. Hazel didn't relax until they were out of the mountains. The fog cleared. Below them, morning sunlight illuminated the Italian countryside—rolling green hills and golden fields not too different from those in Northern California. Hazel could almost imagine she was sailing home to Camp Jupiter."**

" _What?_ "

"There's another camp?"

"Jupiter is the Roman form of Zeus- HOLY GODS, THERE'S A ROMAN CAMP?!"

"This means war!"

"I'm hungry! Can we eat and _then_ go to war?"

"Everyone, silence!" Chiron boomed, causing the entire table to fall silence. He really did have a powerful voice. "This book could be wrong, or many more things! If this is the truth, we cannot change the future or attempt to stop it! The only way we can know is if we keep on reading.

 **"The thought weighed on her chest. Camp Jupiter had only been her home for nine months, since Nico had brought her back from the Underworld."**

There was a second, even louder outburst in the small room:

"Say _what?_ "

"It's possible to bring people back from the dead?"

"What did you do, Nico?"

"Nico, you did what no one else did!"

"Cool!"

"So wait, the narrator's a zombie?"

"HADES, YOU LET THIS HAPPEN?"

" _WHY ARE YOU ASKING ME? THIS IS THE FUTURE, REMEMBER? DON'T LOOK AT ME!"_

"Did the god of the Underworld just answer me- ?"

"Can we just keep reading?"

"I think that's a good idea," Chiron said, shushing the demigods.

 **"But she missed it more than her birthplace of New Orleans, and definitely more than Alaska, where she'd died back in 1942."**

"Our narrator's an _old_ zombie!"

 **"She missed her bunk in the Fifth Cohort barracks. She missed dinners in the mess hall, with wind spirits whisking platters through the air and legionnaires joking about the war games. She wanted to wander the streets of New Rome, holding hands with Frank Zhang."**

"Who's-?"

"No one knows, okay, Grover?"

 **"She wanted to experience just being a regular girl for once, with an actual sweet, caring boyfriend. Most of all, she wanted to feel safe. She was tired of being scared and worried all the time. She stood on the quarterdeck as Nico picked mast splinters out of his arms and Leo punched buttons on the ship's console.**

 **"'Well, that was sucktastic," Leo said. "Should I wake the others?' Hazel was tempted to say yes, but the other crew members had taken the night shift and had earned their rest. They were exhausted from defending the ship. Every few hours, it seemed, some Roman monster had decided the Argo II looked like a tasty treat. A few weeks ago, Hazel wouldn't have believed that anyone could sleep through a numina attack, but now she imagined her friends were still snoring away below decks. Whenever she got a chance to crash, she slept like a coma patient.**

 **"'They need rest," she said. "We'll have to figure out another way on our own.'**

 **"'Huh.' Leo scowled at his monitor. In his tattered work shirt and grease-splattered jeans, he looked like he'd just lost a wrestling match with a locomotive. Ever since their friends..."**

The centaur suddenly stopped talking the middle of the sentence. His face had turned stony, and he put down the book. "Perhaps this has been enough reading for one day."

"But you stopped in the middle of the sentence!" Percy complained, the person sitting closest to Chiron, and grabbed the fallen novel. He flipped to the page they were on, and he opened his mouth to start reading in the place of his teacher. He froze, and his green eyes widened as he mouthed the words of the sentence.

"Percy? What's wrong?" Annabeth asked her boyfriend concernedly.

 **"Ever since their friends Percy and Annabeth had fallen into Tartarus, Leo had been working almost nonstop."**

The whole Big House was quiet, the demigods around the table taking the words in. Annabeth felt a bitter taste in her mouth. "Well, we don't know if this is true," she finally said, her fingers tapping her invisibility cap in front of her. "I mean, just because it's in a book doesn't mean it really happens. We can never tell, it's the future."

"Yeah," Percy agreed, dropping the book like it was on fire. "So, um, will everyone please stop staring at us like we're gonna die?"

Clarisse stood up. "If we're not gonna keep reading, I'm gonna go sharpen my spear."

Slowly the room emptied, until only Percy, Annabeth, Chiron, and the stupid book was left. There was a heavy silence. "I need to get back to my Olympus project," Annabeth declared, tucking her cap into her pocket and swiftly going out the open door.

"What are you going to do with the book?" Percy asked, watching Chiron tap the cover.

"I'll put it somewhere safe," Chiron said simply. "We'll continue reading it tomorrow. Keep in mind, Percy—you don't die. Not according to the summary on the front."

And on that happy note, he let Percy retreated to his cabin.


	4. Chapter 4: Hazel (cont)

**DISCLAIMER: I, OBVIOUSLY, DO NOT OWN ANY OF THESE CHARACTERS. THEY ALL BELONG TO RICK RIORDAN, THE GOD OF TROLLS AND UNNECESSARY DEATH.**

* * *

 **"** **Ever since their friends Percy and Annabeth had fallen into Tartarus, Leo had been working almost nonstop. He'd been acting angrier and even more driven than usual.**

 **"** **Hazel worried about him. But part of her was relieved by the change. Whenever Leo smiled and joked, he looked** ** _too_** **much like Sammy, his great-grandfather…Hazel's first boyfriend, back in 1942. Ugh, why did her life have to be so complicated?"**

"It _is_ complicated," agreed Percy through a mouthful of blue pancakes. The Cabin Councillors were sitting around the long table in the Big House again, this time chewing on hearty breakfasts at 8:00 in the morning. Chiron had the thick book in hand again, continuing from the Tartarus part they left off at, his eyes wandering to the pile of syrup-covered waffles once in a while. Percy and Annabeth didn't look frightened anymore at this thought of their future, but only ignored it. After all, it was the future—if even it was true or not—and they didn't need to worry about it now.

 **"'** **Another way,' Leo muttered. 'Do you see one?' On his monitor glowed a map of Italy. The Apennine Mountains ran down the middle of the boot-shaped country. A green dot for the Argo II blinked on the western side of the range, a few hundred miles north of Rome. Their path should've been simple. They needed to get to a place called Epirus in Greece and find an old temple called the House of Hades (or Pluto, as the Romans called him; or as Hazel like to think of him: the World's Worst Absent Father)."**

At this, about half of the campers chimed in understanding and argued that their own mother/father was more distant. But there were a few like Percy who were just good ol' chums with their godly parent.

 **"** **To reach Epirus, all they had to do was go straight east—over the Apennines and across the Adriatic Sea. But it hadn't worked out that way. Each time they tried to cross the spine of Italy, the mountain gods attacked."**

"'The spine of Italy'?" echoed Grover, munching on some aluminum cans he'd stored in his jacket pocket. "That sounds gross."

Annabeth rolled her eyes at him.

 **"** **For the past two days they'd skirted north, hoping to find a safe pass, with no luck. The** ** _numina montanum_** **were sons of Gaea, Hazel's least favorite goddess. That made them** ** _very_** **determined enemies."**

Percy blanched. "Wait, they're enemies of _Gaea_? Isn't she, like, basically the world itself? How the heck are they still alive if they have _her_ as an enemy?"

"Gaea is asleep right now," Chiron explained. "She has been for many millennia. But perhaps she is rising, not yet at her strongest point."

"Seems kinda stupid to make the Earth your enemy to me."

Travis Stoll pointed his sticky fork at Percy and said, "You're the one who made Kronos your enemy, and this is basically the same thing, almost."

"Hey!" Percy exclaimed.

"And, plus, it says here that you're they're friends, so you're probably Gaea's enemy too, in the future—"

"Back to the book, then." Chiron proclaimed, swallowing his breakfast.

 **"** **The** ** _Argo II_** **couldn't fly high enough to avoid their attacks, and even with all its defense, the ship couldn't make it across the range without being smashed to pieces.**

 **'** **It's our fault,' Hazel said. 'Nico's and mine. The** ** _numina_** **can sense us.' She glanced at her half-brother. Since—"**

"Whoa, whoa, wait," Percy said, putting his palm up in the "stop" motion. "Did you just say 'half-brother'?"

Nico stared at him, and then Chiron. The cabin councillors around the table gaped and started speaking all at once:

"There's _another_ child of the Big Three?"

"I guess they really just gave up on their oath not to have children, huh?'

"No they didn't, this Hazel is a zombie, remember? She was born way before the oath was made! And…zzz…"

"She's not a _zombie_ , Clovis—and don't fall asleep, we're in the middle of the book!"

"Ah, Katie, you know once he's asleep he probably won't wake up for another century or two…"

"Can we please just not question the course of the future? And not discuss the details?" Chiron asked everyone loudly in a pleading voice.

The commotion died down, and Percy clapped Nico on the back. "Coo!" he said brightly. "You've got a half-sister! Well, I guess since that's in the future, she's dead now…" He trailed off when he remembered what happened to his first sister, Bianca. He quickly took his seat again, waiting guiltily for Nico to glare at him again at the memory of the trust Percy betrayed by not saving Bianca. But Nico only shrugged, ignoring the mention of Bianca.

Chiron cleared his throat.

 **"** **She glanced at her half-brother. Since they'd rescued him from the giants—"**

" _What—?_ " the pale boy yelped.

 **"—** **he'd started to regain his strength, but he was still painfully thin. His black shirt and jeans hung off his skeletal frame. Long, dark hair framed his sunken eyes. His olive complexion had turned a sickly greenish white, like the color of tree sap."**

"Sounds like him all the time," Will Solace, the Apollo Cabin counsellor, said. When Nico shot him a sullen look, the blond boy shot him a bright smile. "Kidding, by the way."

 **"** **In human years, he was fourteen, just a year older than Hazel, but that didn't tell the whole story."**

"'Human years'," Grover laughed. "Why does that sound so funny?"

 **"** **Like Hazel, Nico di Angelo was from another era. He radiated a kind of old energy—a melancholy that came from knowing he didn't belong in the modern world. Hazel hadn't known him for very long—"**

"How long is this going to go on and on about Death Boy?" Clarisse groaned—

 **"—** **but she understood, even shared, his sadness. The children of Hades (Pluto—whatever) rarely had happy lives. And judging from what Nico had told her from the night before, their biggest challenge was yet to come when they reached the House of Hades—a challenge he'd implored her to keep secret from the others.**

 **"** **Nico gripped the hilt of his Stygian silver sword. 'Earth spirits don't like the children of the Underworld. That's true. We get under their skin—** ** _literally_** **. But I think the** ** _numina_** **could sense this ship anyway. We're carrying the Athena Parthenos. That thing is like a magical beacon."**

This time, it was Chiron who looked shocked at the book. "The Athena Parthenos? But it can't be—"

"It's lost, isn't it?" Annabeth said in wonder. "Did they really find my mother's statue, after such a long time—?"

 **"** **Hazel shivered, thinking of the massive statue that took up most of the hold. They'd sacrificed so much saving it from the cavern under Rome; but they had no idea what to do with it. So far the only thing it seemed to be good for was alerting more monsters to their presence.**

 **"** **Leo traced his finger down the map of Italy. 'So crossing the mountains is out. Thing is, they go a long way in either direction.'**

 **"'** **We could go by sea," Hazel suggested. 'Sail around the southern tip of Italy.'**

 **"'** **That's a long way," Nico said. 'Plus we don't have…' His voice cracked. 'You know…our sea expert, Percy.' The name hung in the air like a pending storm."**

Present-time Percy's face darkened, and he looked down at his empty plate like he were wishing there were more pancakes for him to distract himself on.

 **"** **Percy Jackson, son of Poseidon…probably the demigod Hazel admired most. He'd saved her life so many times on their quest to Alaska; but when he had needed Hazel's help in Rome, she'd failed him. She'd watched, powerless, as he and Annabeth had plunged into the pit."**

Many of the others, including Chiron, had grave looks on their faces.

 **"** **Hazel took a deep breath. Percy and Annabeth were still alive. She knew that in her heart. She could** ** _still_** **help them if she could get to the House of Hades, if she could survive the challenge Nico had warned her about…**

 **"'** **What about continuing north?" she asked. "There** ** _has_** **to be a break in the mountains, or something.'**

 **"** **Leo fiddled with the bronze Archimedes sphere that he'd installed on the console—his newest and most dangerous toy."**

The Counselor from the Hephaestus cabin's jaw dropped. "Is that referring to—?" Jake Mason started to say in mechanical wonder, but Chiron put a hand up as if to remind him about the whole "not thinking into the details".

 **"** **Every time Hazel looked at the thing, her mouth went dry. She worried that Leo would turn the wrong combination on the sphere and accidentally eject them all from the deck, or turn the Argo II into a giant toaster."**

"I want that," Connor Stoll said, his brain cooking up ways that this Archimedes sphere could be used for pranks and such.

 **"** **Fortunately, they got lucky. The sphere grew a camera lens and projected a 3-D image of the Apennine Mountains above the console.**

 **"'** **I dunno." Leo examined the hologram. 'I don't see any good passes to the north. But I like that idea better than backtracking south. I'm done with Rome.' No one argued with that. Rome had not been a good experience.**

 **"'** **Whatever we do," Nico said, "we have to hurry. Every day that Percy and Annabeth are in Tartarus…'" He didn't need to finish."**

"Ever the morbid one, aren't you?"

 **"** **They had to hope that Percy and Annabeth could survive long enough to get to the Doors of Death. Then, assuming the** ** _Argo II_** **could reach the House of Hades, they** ** _might_** **be able to open the doors on the mortal side, save their friends, and seal the entrance, stopping Gaea's forces from being reincarnated in the mortal world over and over."**

Clarisse whistled. "Not your typical Camp Half-blood quest, is it?"

 **"** **Yes…nothing could go wrong with** ** _that_** **plan.**

 **"** **Nico scowled at the Italian countryside below them. 'Maybe we** ** _should_** **wake the others. This decision affects us all.'**

 **"'** **No,' Hazel said. 'We can find a solution.' She wasn't sure why she felt so strongly about it, but since leaving Rome, the crew had started to lose its cohesion. They'd been learning to work as a team. Then** ** _bam_** **…their two most important members fell into Tartarus."**

"Why does she keep bringing that up…?" Annabeth asked with a wince.

"At least they called us 'important'," Percy grinned.

She grinned back. "Are you sure she wasn't just referring to _me_?"

 **"** **Percy had been their backbone. He had given them confidence as they sailed across the Atlantic and into the Mediterranean. As for Annabeth—she had been the de facto leader of the quest. She'd recovered the Athena Parthenos single-handedly."**

Annabeth's jaw dropped. "I did _what?_ "

 **"** **She was the smartest of the seven, the one with the answers. If Hazel woke up the rest of the crew, they'd just start arguing again, feeling more and more hopeless. She had to make Percy and Annabeth proud of her. She had to take initiative. She couldn't believe her only role in this quest would be what Nico warned her of—removing the obstacle waiting for them at the House of Hades. She pushed the thought aside.**

 **"'** **We need some creative thinking,' she said. 'Another way to cross those mountains, or a way to hide ourselves from the** ** _numina_** **.'**

 **"'** **Nico sighed. 'If I was on my own, I could shadow-travel. But that won't work for an entire ship. And honestly, I'm not sure I have enough strength to even transport** ** _myself_** **anymore.'**

 **"'** **I could maybe rig some camouflage,' Leo said, 'like a smoke screen to hide us in the clouds.' He didn't sound very enthusiastic.**

 **"'** **Hazel stared at the rolling farmland, thinking about what lay beneath it—the realm of her father, lord of the Underworld. She'd only met Pluto once, and she hadn't even realized who he was. She certainly had never expected help from him—not when she was alive the first time, not during her time as a spirit in the Underworld, not since Nico had brought her back to the world of the living. Her dad's servant, Thanatos, god of death, had suggested that Pluto might be doing Hazel a favor by ignoring her."**

"Isn't Hades the god of death?" Drew Tanaka of the Aphrodite cabin asked boredly, snapping a mint gum.

"Nah, there's another god for that. Thanatos."

"Well, aren't _you_ extremely helpful?"

 **"** **After all, she wasn't supposed to be alive. If Pluto took notice of her, he might have to return her to the land of the dead. Which meant calling on Pluto would be a very bad idea. And yet…**

 **"** ** _Please, dad_** **, she found herself praying.** ** _I have to find a way to your temple in Greece—the House of Hades. If you're down there, show me what to do_** **.**

 **"** **At the edge of the horizon, a flicker of movement caught her eye—something small and beige racing across the fields at incredible speed, leaving a vapor trail like a plane's. Hazel couldn't believe it. She didn't dare hope, but it** ** _had_** **to be… 'Arion.'**

 **"'** **What?' Nico asked."**

"What?" said about half the room at the same time.

 **"** **Leo let out a happy whoop as the dust cloud got closer. 'It's her horse, man! You missed that whole part. We haven't seen him since Kansas!'**

 **"** **Hazel laughed—the first time she'd laughed in days. It felt so good to see her old friend. About a mile to the north, the small beige dot circled a hill and stopped at the summit. He was difficult to make out, but when the horse reared and whinnied, the sound carried all the way to the Argo II. Hazel had no doubt—it was Arion.**

 **"'** **We have to meet him,' she said. 'He's here to help.'**

 **"'** **Yeah, okay.' Leo scratched his head. 'But, uh, we talked about not landing the ship on the ground anymore, remember? You know, with Gaea wanting to destroy us and all.'**

 **"'** **Just get me close, and I'll use the rope ladder.' Hazel's heart was pounding. 'I think Arion wants to tell me something.'"**

"And that," Chiron said as he closed the book, "is the end of the chapter."

Everyone started to protest, wanting to read more, but eventually trailed off to their afternoon activities after Chiron didn't budge. The reading was done for the day.


End file.
